Cambridge International AS & A Level

COMPUTER SCIENCE 9618/42

Paper 4 Practical May/June 2024

2 hours 30 minutes

You will need: Candidate source files (listed on page 2)

* 3 7 5 6 1 7 6 8 0 0 *

evidence.doc

INSTRUCTIONS
● Carry out every instruction in each task.
● Save your work using the file names given in the task as and when instructed.
● You must not have access to either the internet or any email system during this examination.
● You must save your work in the evidence document as stated in the tasks. If work is not saved in the
evidence document, you will not receive marks for that task.
● You must use a high‑level programming language from this list:
Java (console mode)
Python (console mode)
Visual Basic (console mode)
● A mark of zero will be awarded if a programming language other than those listed here is used.

INFORMATION
● The total mark for this paper is 75.
● The number of marks for each question or part question is shown in brackets [ ].

This document has 16 pages. Any blank pages are indicated.

DC (PQ/CGW) 329377/3
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Open the evidence document evidence.doc

Make sure that your name, centre number and candidate number will appear on every page of this
document. This document must contain your answers to each question.

Save this evidence document in your work area as:

evidence_ followed by your centre number_candidate number, for example: evidence_zz999_9999

A class declaration can be used to declare a record. If the programming language used does not
support arrays, a list can be used instead.

Three source files are used to answer Question 1. The files are called Easy.txt, Medium.txt and
Hard.txt

1 A program outputs a main word. The program asks the user to enter the different words of 3 or
more letters that can be made from the letters in the main word. These are called the answers.

There are 3 files: Easy.txt, Medium.txt and Hard.txt. Each file has the main word on the
first line. For example, the main word in Easy.txt is house.

The answers are stored in the file. Each answer is on a new line after the main word. For example,
Easy.txt has 14 answers that can be made from the letters in house.

The words read from the text file are stored in the global array WordArray. The number of words
that can be made from the letters in the main word is stored in the global variable NumberWords.

(a) The procedure ReadWords():

• takes a file name as a parameter

• opens the file and reads in the data
• stores the main word in the first element in WordArray
• stores each answer in a new element in WordArray
• counts and stores the number of answers.

Write program code for the procedure ReadWords().

Save your program as Question1_J24.

Copy and paste the program code into part 1(a) in the evidence document.
[6]

(b) The main program asks the user to enter "easy", "medium" or "hard" and calls
ReadWords()with the filename that matches the user’s input. For example, if the user enters
"easy", the parameter is "Easy.txt".

Write program code for the main program.

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 1(b) in the evidence document.
[4]

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(c) (i) The procedure Play():

• outputs the main word from the array and the number of answers
• allows the user to enter words until they enter the word ‘no’ to indicate they want to
stop
• outputs whether each word the user enters is an answer or not an answer
• counts the number of answers the user gets correct
• replaces each answer that the user gets correct with a null value in the array.

Write program code for the procedure Play().

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 1(c)(i) in the evidence document.
[6]

(ii) Amend the procedure Play()so that when the user enters the command to stop, the
procedure:

• outputs the percentage of answers the user entered from the array
• outputs all the answers that the user did not enter.

Write program code to amend Play().

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 1(c)(ii) in the evidence document.
[3]

(d) (i) The procedure ReadWords()calls Play()after the data in the file has been read.

Write program code to amend ReadWords().

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 1(d)(i) in the evidence document.
[1]

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(ii) Test your program by inputting these words in the order shown:

easy

she

out

no

Take a screenshot of the output(s).

Save your program.

Copy and paste the screenshot into part 1(d)(ii) in the evidence document.
[1]
(iii) Test your program by inputting these words in the order shown:

hard

fine

fined

idea

no

Take a screenshot of the output(s).

Save your program.

Copy and paste the screenshot into part 1(d)(iii) in the evidence document.
[1]

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2 A binary tree stores data in ascending order. For example:

15

8 19

3 10
A computer program stores integers in a binary tree in ascending order. The program uses
Object‑Oriented Programming (OOP).

The binary tree is stored as a 1D array of nodes. Each node contains a left pointer, a data value
and a right pointer.

The class Node stores the data about a node.

Node
LeftPointer : INTEGER stores the index of the node to the left in the binary tree

Data : INTEGER stores the node’s data

RightPointer : INTEGER stores the index of the node to the right in the binary tree
Constructor() initialises Data to its parameter value
initialises LeftPointer and RightPointer to −1

GetLeft() returns the left pointer

GetRight() returns the right pointer

GetData() returns the data value

SetLeft() assigns the parameter to the left pointer

SetRight() assigns the parameter to the right pointer

SetData() assigns the parameter to the data

(a) (i) Write program code to declare the class Node and its constructor.

Do not declare the other methods.

Use the appropriate constructor for your programming language.

If you are writing in Python, include attribute declarations using comments.

Save your program as Question2_J24.

Copy and paste the program code into part 2(a)(i) in the evidence document.
[4]
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(ii) The get methods GetLeft(), GetRight()and GetData()each return the relevant
attribute.

Write program code for the three get methods.

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 2(a)(ii) in the evidence document.
[3]

(iii) The set methods SetLeft(), SetRight()and SetData()each take a parameter and
then store this in the relevant attribute.

Write program code for the three set methods.

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 2(a)(iii) in the evidence document.
[3]

(b) The class TreeClass stores the data about the binary tree.

TreeClass
Tree[0:19] : Node an array of 20 elements of type Node

FirstNode : INTEGER stores the index of the first node in the tree

NumberNodes : INTEGER stores the quantity of nodes in the tree

Constructor() initialises FirstNode to −1 and NumberNodes to 0
initialises each element in Tree to a Node object with the
data value of −1

InsertNode() takes a Node object as a parameter, inserts it in the array

and updates the pointer for its parent node

OutputTree() outputs the left pointer, data and right pointer of each
node in Tree

Nodes cannot be deleted from this tree.

(i) Write program code to declare the class TreeClass and its constructor.

Do not declare the other methods.

Use the appropriate constructor for your programming language.

If you are writing in Python, include attribute declarations using comments.

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 2(b)(i) in the evidence document.
[4]
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(ii) The method InsertNode()takes a Node object, NewNode, as a parameter and inserts
it into the array Tree.

InsertNode()first checks if the tree is empty.

If the tree is empty, InsertNode():

• stores NewNode in the array Tree at index NumberNodes

• increments NumberNodes
• stores 0 in FirstNode.

If the tree is not empty, InsertNode():

• stores NewNode in the array Tree at index NumberNodes

• accesses the data in the array Tree at index FirstNode and compares it to the
data in NewNode
• repeatedly follows the pointers until the correct position for NewNode is found
• once the position is found, InsertNode()sets the left or right pointer of its parent
node
• increments NumberNodes.

Write program code for InsertNode().

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 2(b)(ii) in the evidence document.
[6]

(iii) The method OutputTree()outputs the left pointer, the data and the right pointer for
each node that has been inserted into the tree. The outputs are in the order they are
saved in the array.

If there are no nodes in the array, the procedure outputs ‘No nodes’.

Write program code for OutputTree().

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 2(b)(iii) in the evidence document.
[4]

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(c) (i) The main program declares an instance of TreeClass with the identifier TheTree.

Write program code for the main program.

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 2(c)(i) in the evidence document.
[1]

(ii) The main program inserts the following integers into the binary tree in the order given:

10

11

20

15

The main program then calls the method OutputTree().

Write program code to amend the main program.

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 2(c)(ii) in the evidence document.
[4]

(iii) Test your program.

Take a screenshot of the output(s).

Save your program.

Copy and paste the screenshot into part 2(c)(iii) in the evidence document.
[1]

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3 A program sorts an array of integers and searches the array for a particular value.

(a) The array of integers, NumberArray, stores the following data in the order given:

100 85 644 22 15 8 1

The array is declared and initialised local to the main program.

Write program code to declare and initialise the array.

Save your program as Question3_J24.

Copy and paste the program code into part 3(a) in the evidence document.
[1]

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(b) (i) The following recursive pseudocode function sorts the array into ascending order using
an insertion sort and returns the sorted array.

DECLARE LastItem : INTEGER

DECLARE CheckItem : INTEGER
DECLARE LoopAgain : BOOLEAN
FUNCTION RecursiveInsertion(IntegerArray : ARRAY[] OF INTEGER,
NumberElements : INTEGER) RETURNS ARRAY[] OF INTEGER
IF NumberElements <= 1 THEN
RETURN IntegerArray
ELSE
CALL RecursiveInsertion(IntegerArray, NumberElements - 1)
LastItem IntegerArray[NumberElements - 1]
CheckItem NumberElements - 2
ENDIF
LoopAgain TRUE
IF CheckItem < 0 THEN
LoopAgain FALSE
ELSE
IF IntegerArray[CheckItem] < LastItem THEN
LoopAgain FALSE
ENDIF
ENDIF
WHILE LoopAgain
IntegerArray[CheckItem + 1] IntegerArray[CheckItem]
CheckItem CheckItem - 1
IF CheckItem < 0 THEN
LoopAgain FALSE
ELSE
IF IntegerArray[CheckItem] < LastItem THEN
LoopAgain FALSE
ENDIF
ENDIF
ENDWHILE
IntegerArray[CheckItem + 1] LastItem
RETURN IntegerArray
ENDFUNCTION

Write the program code for the pseudocode function RecursiveInsertion().

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 3(b)(i) in the evidence document.
[4]

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(ii) Amend the main program to:

• call RecursiveInsertion()with the initialised array NumberArray and the

number of elements as parameters
• output the word ‘Recursive’
• output the content of the returned array.

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 3(b)(ii) in the evidence document.
[2]

(iii) Test your program.

Take a screenshot of the output(s).

Save your program.

Copy and paste the screenshot into part 3(b)(iii) in the evidence document.
[1]

(c) The function RecursiveInsertion()can be changed to use iteration instead of recursion.

(i) Write program code for the function IterativeInsertion()to perform the same
processes as RecursiveInsertion()but using iteration instead of recursion.

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 3(c)(i) in the evidence document.
[4]

(ii) Write program code to amend the main program to also:

• call IterativeInsertion()with the original initialised array NumberArray

• output the word ‘iterative’
• output the content of the returned array.

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 3(c)(ii) in the evidence document.
[1]

(iii) Test your program.

Take a screenshot of the output(s).

Save your program.

Copy and paste the screenshot into part 3(c)(iii) in the evidence document.
[1]

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(d) The recursive function BinarySearch()takes the parameters:

• IntegerArray – an array of integers

• First – the index of the first array element
• Last – the index of the last array element
• ToFind – an integer to search for in the array.

The function uses recursion to perform a binary search for ToFind in IntegerArray.
The function returns the index where ToFind is stored or returns −1 if ToFind is not in the
array.

(i) Write program code for the recursive function BinarySearch().

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 3(d)(i) in the evidence document.
[6]

(ii) Write program code to amend the main program to:

• call BinarySearch()with the sorted array and the integer 644 as the search value
• output ‘Not found’ if 644 is not found in the array
• output the index if 644 is found in the array.

Save your program.

Copy and paste the program code into part 3(d)(ii) in the evidence document.
[2]

(iii) Test your program.

Take a screenshot of the output(s).

Save your program.

Copy and paste the screenshot into part 3(d)(iii) in the evidence document.
[1]

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reasonable effort has been made by the publisher (UCLES) to trace copyright holders, but if any items requiring clearance have unwittingly been included, the
publisher will be pleased to make amends at the earliest possible opportunity.

To avoid the issue of disclosure of answer‑related information to candidates, all copyright acknowledgements are reproduced online in the Cambridge
Assessment International Education Copyright Acknowledgements Booklet. This is produced for each series of examinations and is freely available to download
at www.cambridgeinternational.org after the live examination series.

Cambridge Assessment International Education is part of Cambridge Assessment. Cambridge Assessment is the brand name of the University of Cambridge
Local Examinations Syndicate (UCLES), which is a department of the University of Cambridge.

© UCLES 2024 9618/42/M/J/24